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About Site Filming

With the prevalence of video everywhere online, you’d think that the FBI would be on the bandwagon, taking video footage of every scene they investigate. But when I participated in the FBI’s 10-week Citizen’s Academy, presented by the Miami office, I’ve learned that’s not true.

The Bureau does use videotape in a number of ways — for example, in videos for education and training purposes. In 2015, they produced a film about an emergency response scenario at George Mason University’s Prince William Campus in Virginia. Last year, several agents came to Broward College in South Florida, where I teach, to present a film about a naïve college student recruited by the Chinese government as a spy – based on a real life incident.

The most newsworthy relates to the fatal shooting of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge occupier LaVoy Finicum. The Bureau released the video in order to provide “an honest and unfiltered view of what happened and how it happened,” according to comments made by Greg Bretzing, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI in Oregon.

Bretzing continues, “The plane is following the vehicles, and the camera sometimes pans from one vehicle to the other, a white truck in front and a Jeep in back. At other times when the vehicles are in a fixed location, the plane is flying in a pattern over that location. Because of that flight pattern, there are portions where trees obscure what is happening.”

I thought it was interesting that the press release included this note: “Pilots use Zulu Time, also known as Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), when they fly. Zulu time is eight hours ahead of Pacific Standard Time (PST). Therefore, although this footage was taken on January 26, 2016 in Oregon, the date/time stamp on the video shows just after midnight January 27, 2016.”

I can see how small details like that might confuse people or make them believe that the footage had been altered in some way. And how the obscured vision could also cause questions or controversy.

This video covered an ongoing action, however, rather than filming a crime scene, which is an area that I cover in my new book, The Next One Will Kill You. I learned that the Bureau has a policy against taking video footage of crime scenes as part of evidence gathering. Here’s an excerpt from the book that explains why.

“The FBI never takes video footage of a scene,” I said, remembering what I had learned at the academy.

“Why not?”

“You never know what might get into the video that might turn out to be prejudicial to a case down the road,” I said. “Like, an agent joking in the background could show evidence of prejudice.”

“And?”

“Video gives you too much information,” I said. “It makes it hard to focus in on what’s important. Taking still pictures makes you pay attention to what you want in the shot. You have to make conscious decisions about angles and lighting and what to include or leave out.”

“Very good.” We watched as the photographer turned his camera on the crowd that had assembled to watch us work.

I’d heard that it was true that criminals often returned to see first-hand the destruction they had wrought. And whoever rented the warehouse might have come over to see what was going on. So shots of the crowd might prove useful in the future.

I watched as the photographer moved in closer to the bay itself. Another agent, a blonde woman, recorded a paper list of everything that was photographed, including the specifics of each exposure. It was all part of building a case for prosecution.

A third agent had a pad and pencil and was drawing sketches of the property. With a drawing you could remove unnecessary detail that crowded a photo, and the act of drawing helped the eye focus on what was important.

I loved my time at the Citizen’s Academy, even the sessions about job applications and paperwork, because I learned so much. I covered page after page of my notebook with information and it was a real struggle not to throw it all in the first book of my Angus Green series!

To see some FBI videos: https://www.fbi.gov/news/videos
To learn more about the FBI Citizen’s Academy: https://www.fbi.gov/about-us/partnerships_and_outreach/community_outreach/citizens_academies

About the Book

The Next One Will Kill You: An Angus Green Novel (Angus Green Series, Book 1)

If Angus Green is going to make it to a second case, he’s needs to survive the first one.

Angus wants more adventure than a boring accounting job, so after graduating with his master’s degree he signs up with the FBI. He’s assigned to the Miami field office, where the caseload includes smugglers, drug runners, and gangs, but he starts out stuck behind a desk, an accountant with a badge and gun.

Struggling to raise money for his little brother’s college tuition, he enters a strip trivia contest at a local bar. But when he’s caught with his pants down by a couple of fellow agents, he worries that his extracurricular activities and his status as the only openly gay agent will crash his career. Instead, to his surprise, he’s added to an anti-terrorism task force and directed to find a missing informant.

It’s his first real case: a desperate chase to catch a gang of criminals with their tentacles in everything from medical fraud to drugs to jewel theft. With every corner in this case―from Fort Lauderdale’s gay bars to the morgue―turning to mayhem, Angus quickly learns that the only way to face a challenge is to assume that he’ll survive this one―it’s the next one that will kill him.

About the Author

Neil Plakcy has written or edited over three dozen novels and short stories in mystery, romance and erotica. He is an assistant professor of English at Broward College in South Florida, and has been a construction manager, a computer game producer, and a web developer – all experiences he uses in his fiction. His website is www.mahubooks.com.

To win your own ebook, please send an email to contest@gmail.com with “NEXT ONE WILL KILL YOU” as the subject.

You must include the email address where you’d like the ebook sent.

All entries must be received by November 30, 2016. Two (2) names will be drawn from all qualified entries and notified via email. This contest is open to all adults over 18 years of age in the United States only. Your ebook will be sent by Diversion Publishing.

One entry per email address. Subscribers to the monthly newsletter earn an extra entry into every contest. Follow this blog to earn another entry into every contest. Winners may win only one time per year (365 days) for contests with prizes of more than one book. Your email address will not be shared or sold to anyone.

11/16 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch

The Next One Will Kill You by Neil Plakcy. Diversion Publishing (November 15, 2016). ASIN: B01KUAGZ0I. 207p.

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Please welcome my guest blogger, Chris Formant!

One evening, I was walking through my rock memorabilia gallery, with The Doors music in the background, and I stopped to study my latest addition: a two-page article in the Record Mirror from 1964 announcing a hot new band: The Rolling Stones. What struck me the most was how young they were; a fresh-faced Keith Richards, a teenaged Mick Jagger, and Brian Jones, the founder of the Stones. Hanging right next to Jimi Hendrix, and Jim Morrison memorabilia.

Jones, Hendrix and Morrison all died at the age 27 under cloudy circumstances. Urban legends and conspiracy theories have swirled around their deaths for almost 50 years.

An idea got in my head at just that moment that I couldn’t shake and kept haunting me for days. What if they didn’t die by accident? What if they all were murdered?

That is how Bright Midnight got started. A fictional murder mystery that re-imagines the deaths of iconic late 60s and 70s rock stars, not as accidents but as murders.

Creating the original story line was the easy part. More difficult was crafting a sophisticated investigation that would be intriguing to a 21st-century reader.

A former editor of Rolling Stone magazine helped provide unique insight into the personalities of many of the stars. While gaining access to the archives of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, including original editor and reporter files on each rock star, brought the era vividly to life.

Additionally, former FBI and NYPD investigators, helped me understand the forensic processes and modern cold-case investigative techniques that could apply. Lastly, a top neurosurgeon and researcher from Johns Hopkins Medicine helped interpret the autopsies and suggested alternative means by which the stars could have died physically and chemically.

That set the stage for a creative reimagining of the deaths, seen through the lenses of modern forensic practices and with the application of the latest technology. But even the latest technology couldn’t bridge some of the investigative gaps.

So, being a technologist, I imagined new technologies that are not currently in existence or considered highly experimental. The joys of fiction!

One of the technologies I created was a digital fabric analysis via photo analytics, not unlike the technique used when actual clothing fiber is found at the murder scene. In Bright Midnight, this allowed the FBI to identify the fabric type, the manufacturer, and the possible retail outlet and time period.

Another imagined technology was the use of a virtual crime scene simulator that created life-size holographic murder scenes from the original crime scene photos. Extremely graphic, these allowed a unique 3-dimensional recreation of the murder scene that could be simulated and alternative scenarios tested. Both technologies sound like they could be possible in the future, so their application in Bright Midnight seems realistic.

One thing that proved key to creating unique murder delivery vehicles were actually the autopsies themselves, combined with the limited forensic techniques used at that time. That combination allowed me to envision a much wider set of possible murder options and allowed me to engineer possible chemical causes of some of the murders that would leave consistent chemical traces to the original autopsy.

The result of this melding of modern forensic techniques, imagined future technologies, and advanced analytics with old fashioned investigative gut instincts created a unique, fictional rock-and-roll murder mystery that brings the craft of thriller writing to the genre for the first time.

About the Author

CHRIS FORMANT, who got his start in rock and roll in his early “garage band’ days, never dreamed he would one day hold a seat on the Board of Trustees of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Today he is still a student of rock and roll and an avid collector of rock memorabilia. As an executive in a leading global company, running a multi-billion-dollar business, Formant is the unlikeliest of authors of a murder mystery. However, the continued unanswered questions surrounding the deaths of our most iconic rock legends led Formant to first speculate and then re-imagine what would happen if cutting-edge technology were applied to these famous cold cases. By conducting exhaustive research into the archives of the Hall of Fame, studying advanced forensics techniques and gaining creative insights from top doctors, FBI investigators and a former editor of Rolling Stone magazine, Formant crafted what is being referred to as the “The DaVinci Code for Rock and Roll Fans.”

11/16 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch™

BRIGHT MIDNIGHT by Chris Formant. HighLine Editions; New edition edition (October 27, 2016). ISBN 978-1941286920. 275p.